


Saving Tony

by jehall2



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), X-Men (Movieverse)
Genre: Civil War Team Iron Man, Completely AU, Crossover AU of MCU, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Don't Like Black Widow and Never Will, Gregory Stark is Iron Man, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, I can't think of anything else yet!, Not always team Cap friendly, Other, Steve makes questionable choices when Bucky Barnes is involved, Tony Stark is a mutant, little brother Tony
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-04
Updated: 2020-05-05
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:07:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24011050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jehall2/pseuds/jehall2
Summary: Gregory Stark has taken on the role of Iron man, but only grudgingly works with the Avengers to protect his secret.  Nick Fury has information about another Stark.  He doesn't know everything though.  Tony Stark has a secret that Gregory will do anything to protect, because if Fury finds out what Tony is there will be no keeping him safe.  And that is the one thing Gregory Stark cannot stand.  If only the universe knew how important Gregory's mission is as well.Fury May have Gregory Stark over a barrel, but he's still no pushover.  An MCU AU where Gregory Stark is Iron Man, Tony Stark is a mutant mentored by Charles Xavier and, later, Magneto, and it's still up to Tony to save the universe.
Comments: 21
Kudos: 195





	1. After New York

Gregory sat quietly tapping on his phone while Fury droned on and on and on about New York. Normally he would have just got up and left, but he liked to be in the know, and this seemed like a debrief he might actually want to sit in on.

“That’s why we’ll be setting the Avengers up in Stark Tower. Stark, we’ll need to rename it, of course, and I’d like the repairs done as soon as possible. It’s not a good idea to have the Avengers hanging around the helicarrier for too long,” Fury said without batting an eye. Hill was nodding and jotting down notes and the Avengers were looking on gratefully. Well, Cap and Barton looked grateful, Natasha was pulling her “I’m a spy and don’t have real human emotions” robot face and Banner just looked constipated. Thor had taken off for Asgard with Loki almost immediately.

“I’m sorry. I zoned out for a moment. What was that about the Avengers staying in Stark Tower,” Gregory asked incredulously.

“I said the Avengers will be staying in Avengers Tower,” Nick said imperiously, crossing his arms and glaring at Gregory. Natasha looked a little like she was about to smirk now.

“Oh, I didn’t know you were going to be renting out any floors, Nicky. And I’m quite certain that you noticed the giant Stark sign at the top of the building.”

“Don’t be cute, Stark. That sign got blown off—a perfect moment for you to replace it, but we need the Avengers together.”

“Uh, Stark Tower is SI’s main, corporate building. We do business there and house SI employees that work on sensitive data. I don’t exactly need a super hero group living there drawing the attention of whatever the next giant threat is, Nick. No.”

“So, you didn’t want to be an Avenger,” Nick smirked, playing his trump card.

“Did you miss me saying that I didn’t want to be a part of your super-secret boyband, Fury. Is your memory finally going?”

Nick paused for a moment, surprised that Stark wasn’t immediately jumping on drawing the team together. Widow has reassured him that Stark was hooked when she related the Shawarma story after the New York Battle. It seemed like the perfect moment to strike while the iron was hot.

“Look, Stark. I’m willing to overlook the primary assessment in exchange for housing the team. I think we can all agree that we don’t need them directly under the supervision of the WSC.”

“You mean that piece of shit report that Romanoff wrote up about me while I was dying from heavy metal poisoning? You can take that thing or leave it, what do I care. She’s no psychologist—not even a very good profiler,” Gregory scoffed with a derogatory look at Nat that had her, the Captain, and Barton all bristling. “Narcissists don’t save cities, Romanoff,” he said with a smirk. “But she’s right that I’m not a team player—because I don’t need to be one, Nick.”

“I need everyone out,” Nick said. Hill immediately stood. Widow followed, sashaying out of the meeting room with Cap and Clint close behind. Bruce skittered out, and that left Gregory and Nick.

“You’re seriously going to try another power play on me, Nick? That doesn’t work so well when I’m not out of my mind on palladium.”

“You know who this is,” Nick asked nonchalantly. He slid over a picture and Gregory’s face became stone.

He sat quietly for a moment, and then looked up at Fury.

“Think very carefully before you go this route, Director.” Gregory’s choice of words was a direct threat, and Nick knew it. But Fury also knew that a bigger threat was currently working its way through SHIELD like termites, threatening the foundation of the agency that he had worked to build up after Agent Carter retired and Howard Stark was assassinated. He couldn’t let that destroy the Avengers. The New York Battle was all the indication he needed to know that he had been right about what they would mean to world security. And Gregory Stark may be a wild card, but he needed him to make this work. 

“I will always do what I have to. If you force my hand—well, that’s on you, Stark. But I’m asking you to step up and do what’s right instead.”

“What you call right,” Gregory sneered, pocketing the picture. “I want to be clear on this. I will allot a space for the Avengers in a separate compound in upstate New York, but you will be funding this endeavor alongside me AND you will be handling the upkeep of the Avengers once the building is complete. SI will stay out of this completely, Fury. I have worked to build this for HIM, with HIM. You will not touch that,” Stark hissed.

Fury nodded and Stark strode angrily from the room.

Once Gregory was outside the meeting room, he pulled the picture from his pocket. A small, dark haired boy with a gap-toothed grin and riotous brown curls falling into golden brown eyes stared back at him, his thin arm slung around a robot with a claw arm. Greg stroked the photo once with a soft smile, pocketed the picture once more and continued down the hall, his face completely blank once more.


	2. Tony Stark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Little brother.

Gregory sat with his legs crossed, silently watching the byplay between the boy and the man in the wheel chair. Another man stood smoking a cigar in the corner.

“What do you see, Anthony,” the man in the wheel-chair asked, his voice both kind and reassuring despite the tenseness the question caused.

The boy’s eyes flashed a brilliantl blue, his whole body tremored and his head twitched violently. The man placed a reassuring hand between his shoulder blades and closed his eyes in response.

“What do you see,” he asked again.

“I see . . . I see . . . I see . . .”he repeated robotically.

“Anthony?”

The boy shuddered, blinked, his eyes flashed first blue then brown, then blue again.

“I see trees? I see Logan?” The boy turned and focused away from the window to look at the Professor in the wheel chair.

“Very good! Hold that. Yes.”

Tony’s eyes flashed blue again, glowing intensely.

“And now?”

“I see you, Professor.” Tony turned and looked at Gregory, smiling in that way that lit the room when they were together. “I see Gregory!”

The professor smiled, raising his hands to the boy’s head.

“Very good. A success, Anthony. Now, I know you are glad to see Gregory, but great successes may cause great strain early in the process. I’m going to put the block back in place, Anthony.”

Tony looked at Gregory for a moment more before his lip quivered.

“I understand, Professor,” he said solemnly. 

The Professor nodded with a sad smile, closed his eyes once more. Logan strode forward just in time to catch Tony as he collapsed.

“He did better this time,” Logan said, hefting the light boy in his arms and carrying him to Gregory who reached for him.

“Can’t you put that thing out,” Gregory said as he took Tony gently in his arms. 

Logan smirked.

“He lasted fifteen minutes this time,” Gregory said with a smile and a nod at the Professor who finally sagged in his chair as well.

“Charles,” Logan said, worriedly.

“I’m fine, Logan. Tony is powerful enough that it taxes even me to control the flow of information, however. He’s getting signals from further out, Gregory,” Charles added with a significant look to the other man.

“How far,” Gregory asked with a frown.

“I believe you have first hand experience with some of those signals, Gregory—from New York, beyond New York?”

“No,” Gregory whispered, shuddering as he thought of the cold expanse of space surrounding him as an army of monsters headed towards the earth.

“You cannot let Nick Fury learn of what Tony can do, Gregory,” he said with a shake of his head. “Or you will never see your brother again. He is the most powerful technopath I have ever met. It’s imperative that you keep that away from other interested parties as well,” he added, shifting focus to Logan.

“Magneto,” Logan said, crossing his arms.

“If I’m not mistaken, Tony can impact more than code, light, and sound signals. I think he might be able to manipulate those to move the materials that harness those as well. Yes, Magneto would like to control him.”

“Charles, I’m less interested in that right now. I just want him to be able to see again.”

“But your brother sees fine, Gregory?”

“Not the code, Charles. You know he loses everything else when you put up the barriers.”

“I’m afraid it is the only way. Tony would lose himself completely without my barriers until he learns to control his powers. And he is to young, weak in body, to make a real attempt at that now without risking insanity.”

“It hurts him, Charles,” Gregory moaned.

And that was the rub of it. It was too much without the barriers that only Professor X of the X-Men could put in place, but it was too little with the barriers as well. Blindness was one thing. It would be sad, but Gregory knew that Tony would eventually learn to adapt to blindness—but the barriers caused an echoing silence as the data tried inexorably to work its way through. It was both sensory deprivation with the constant threat of sensory overload, as Tony had described hearing it at the edge of his consciousness. Gregory would see him begin to drift away every now and again as they sat working in the lab together, his eyes flickering from brown to blue as his powers battered against Charles’s telepathic protections. Gregory was terrified those dams would break and he would lose his little brother, his miracle, forever.


	3. Tony's Story

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A little back story.

Everyone knew about Gregory Stark, the heir of Stark Industries, son of the great patriot and war hero Howard Stark—now also Iron Man. What no one, or rather very few people, knew, was that he was not an only child at all. 

Howard Stark had an affair. Well, really, he had many affairs. Had Howard and Maria Stark not been assassinated when they were, the couple would have likely been divorced within the next few months and the Stark fortune split cleanly down the middle since it was Howard who had cheated.

Cheating was one thing. Maria had affairs too after all. It was not a happy marriage, just a convenient one that provided Howard Stark with a suitable heir. Getting caught cheating, however, was another thing entirely. Maria Carbonell had enough wealth and political connections before marrying Howard Stark that she didn’t have to put up with the embarrassment of a bastard child though.

*flashback*  
“I don’t understand why you don’t get rid of it,” Gregory said indifferently. The toddler was building with blocks in a corner. He had already built a small city including skyscrapers and transportation, but genius was everyday in the Stark household. Gregory did note that his hands were quite graceful for his age. That was impressive he supposed. He was cute, but Gregory had no interest in splitting his inheritance as Maria and Howard were suggesting.

“There’s something wrong with it,” Howard sneered, downing his scotch.

“What,” Gregory asked, intrigued.

Of course, Gregory had learned about “what was wrong” with Tony in the worst way possible. 

One late night while he was working in the lab, all of the machinery began going haywire. Things switched on and off at random, every phone (including the mobiles) began ringing, and encrypted information began scrolling across Gregory’s computers. He was baffled, running upstairs to check on the rest of the property only to find Howard (drunk, of course) screaming at Tony and shaking the boy as he seized in his arms.

The scene brought Gregory up short. He could admit he wasn’t the most empathetic person, but seeing the helpless boy go through what he had as a child, but as he seized and shook, completely vulnerable and unaware, was apparently more than he could stand.

“Stop it, Howard! What are you doing?”

“It’s him! It’s him—the little freak. He’s causing it,” Howard slurred before striking the little boy who fell to the floor and only began to seize harder.

Gregory snatched the boy up into his arms and held him as tightly as he could until the jerking gradually eased off. Howard sneered until he passed out in a chair nearby. It wasn’t until all was quiet again that Gregory remembered Tony’s eyes, his lovely golden-brown eyes, had glowed blue. And he could have sworn that was code scrolling across them. And as Gregory thought about what he had witnessed he suddenly realized that he was invested. There didn’t seem to be any going back now. It didn’t make any sense to his usually rational mind, but it was what it was.

*end flashback*

Weeks later when Howard and Maria Stark died “in a car crash”, his only thought was “Well, that will make everything easier.” Even when little Tony, after another horrific fit that left them both with tremors, informed him that Howard and Maria hadn’t died in an accident—they had been killed. Tony was amazingly good at flushing out secrets that no one wanted known. It was only a shame that it came at such a high price.

They carried on, Gregory both hiding Tony’s existence and trying to help him in any way that he could. The problem was that he had absolutely no idea what to do to help. Tony’s problem wasn’t exactly epilepsy, so, he couldn’t just call in any medical professional.

He had been at his wit’s end, almost in tears as they carried on with little to no change besides the slow and steady deterioration of the little boy that he was becoming so fond of. It was at that point that a miracle had happened. 

“Mr. Stark, My name is Charles Xavier, and I believe that I can help you.”


End file.
